Red and blue have been blasting through my door
roaring and romping a mighty chorus
stomping through my days
both dying to feel me up
I feel hardy when they love
but they are not mine to keep.

They come to me as scarves and scales
as patches to post over my bodies
and lay
muddy and weak
myself to be seen.
These colors flash secrets of superficiality
savor the feeling of severed psyche
with puzzlingly pieced anatomy.

Blue boiling with my boyhood
my mind over smooth shoulders swells.
I stand beside my dad - his sharp eyes teach me
the game of absorption and receiving.

His eyes trap a moment
hold it up by its collar
(look dad, no hands!)
shake loose
collecting hidden tokens
fiddling,
flipping them in his fingers
a trophy of bladed knowledge.

But my father is color blind.
He does not know which threads to cut
when I plead
*help me detangle